After a 10-year run, Chicago Fringe Festival calls it quits

After a ten-year run, the Chicago Fringe Festival on Friday announced it is ceasing operations.

A fixture on Chicago’s theater scene, the festival celebrated “the weird and unpredictable” when it came to stage productions. Nearly 400 shows were presented over the course of the decade, with 100 percent of the ticket sales (a 10-year total of $231,654) going to artists both local and from across the globe who presented their unjuried and uncensored shows under the auspices of the festival. Traditionally, tickets were $10 and shows were one-hour in length.

The festival was held each year over the Labor Day weekend at various Jefferson Park venues including The Gift Theatre, the Copernicus Center and the Congregational Church of Jefferson park, among others, and featured 30 performance groups determined by lottery.

“As our festival has grown, so have the personal and professional lives of our volunteer staff,” said festival executive director Anne Cauley in Friday’s announcement. “Unfortunately, at this time, we are unable to commit to the demands of an annual festival. I am so grateful for the astonishing community of volunteers, artists and patrons that came together to embrace, weird, inventive, challenging performances from around the world.”

The festival also announced it will be granting its assets to other fringecentric theater arts organizations.

A 10-year celebration party is slated for June 1 at Windsor Tavern (4530 N. Milwaukee).